There is something weighing on my mind in regards to the story which doesn’t seem to line up.
We enter the Shadowlands and get told that the Arbiter is the fair judge of all souls. They recognise and send souls towards one of infinite areas. (edited! ty)
Furthermore it is clear that the Arbiter’s judgement is final - first when we arrive, then again during the Kyrian and Maldraxxi campaign when Alexandria was questioning his judgement.
Pelagos is shown as a flawed character from the start. A headfast go-getting aspirant with a touch of immaturity. He does develop as a character through out the story, observing you for most of the Korthia one and helping and ‘feels a sense of purpose’ during Zerith Mortis thinking how great it would be to be a selfless vessel.
Does this really qualify him to become the Arbiter of all souls that enter the Shadowlands? His interaction and way of speaking doesn’t change too much after he comes an Arbiter.
Does his duties pause as he talks to someone?
From what I saw of the story, Pelagos got the job simply because he volunteered his anima/life-force/soul when Nathrezim sabotaged the plan to make a new Arbiter.
That whole situation was poorly written so we don’t know the mechanics.
A standout moment is that Sylvanas got a whole trial sequence when the Arbiter is supposed to be able to see a person’s entire life… but Pelagos didn’t use that with Sylvanas AND even deferred the judgement to someone else.
This makes me think that Arbiter Sylvanas really was the direction the story was going to go at one point - WoW’s version of “Kerrigan becomes a Xel’naga” - but the writers changed their minds due to backlash.
The Arbiter sends each soul to one of an infinite number of afterlives, some already made and home to other souls, and others made to purpose if a soul is found to be unsuited to any that already exist. A comparatively tiny fraction of souls actually get sent to one of the four “utility” afterlives that protect and maintain the rest, let alone to the Maw.
Moreover it was indicated that there are a number of “Revendreth lite” realms where souls can be sent if they’re burdened by lesser sins or doubts that call for less intensive approaches to alleviate than the methods employed by the venthyr.
The decision also isn’t definitively final; when it’s working as intended (i.e. before Denathrius turned traitor and started hoarding souls for anima to send the the Jailer, and presumably now that Renethal’s in charge) only a small number of souls in Revendreth actually choose to remain indefinitely and become venthyr, while the rest all eventually either return to Oribos to face a second judgment once they’ve been redeemed, or proved so fundamentally unrepentant that they were eventually cast into the Maw. The latter (again, when the system wasn’t being subverted by Denathrius to feed the Maw) likely only applied once a soul had been completely exhausted of anima and still refused to atone, as without anima - in effect the manifested essence of potential and change within a soul - it would be rendered functionally impossible for the venthyr to continue the process.
In being so, would this not even mean it’s even more weird that Pelagos is given this responsibility? Does he automatically get the powers and understanding that the previous one did?
Sounds like Pelagos did. But that makes it strange why he had to talk about Sylvanas when he could’ve instantly seen into her heart and mind and had everything he needed for a verdict.
That would depend upon whether he could do so with her soul still in her body. As undead, she’s technically not “all dead,” so he or any other Arbiter may only be able read the life of an entire soul once it’s properly and fully died and been brought across the Veil into Oribos.
There seems to be some sort of change in a soul that comes from true death; something that causes its changes and accomplishments in life to become anima, the “native” energy medium of the Shadowlands that can be most readily accessed by its denizens. Being made undead and pulled back through the veil probably reverses that, changing the soul back into the sort of energy medium that souls are when they’re still alive.
If you dig deep enough into the lore, Zovaal was also imperfect but deemed a suitable Arbiter by the First Ones since they placed him there. That said, it’s implied that his decisions weren’t always the fairest and that he was prone to emotional biases.
“The Arbiter” that we see in Shadowlands, however, was not placed there by the First Ones. If I recall, it was pretty much just a machine placed there to serve Zovaal’s role after he became the Jailer.
By that logic, Pelagos has just as much of a right as the robot before him to be the Arbiter, as neither were chosen by the original creators of the system.
That said, Pelagos might have a slightly better claim to the role just through us actually using the tools in Zereth Mortis to make that happen.
tl;dr: The role of Arbiter was originally made with a flawed person in mind, so it’s probably fine.
I guess I don’t see why we can’t just assume that in ascending to Arbiter, one gains supernatural insight and knowledge and computational speed? All that was needed from Pelagos was a pure soul who sought to do right, and the rest is just an upgrade in processing power, so to speak.
And also, Sylvanas was a bit of a special case, in that Pelagos sensed he probably had to acquiesce a bit to Tyrande and others, else they, uh, burn down the entirety of the Shadowlands in violent protest. The Maw is likely far worse than what Pelagos would have chosen as atonement, but Sylvanas was willing to go along with it out of guilt, so he just said “cool, two problems solved at once!”
I was mostly just interested if he maintained any semblance of control or essentially the job does its work for him and he just chills there for the rest of eternity.
Cause if it is him suddenly getting all these upgrades, essentially it could have been anyone deemed a pure vessel. The rest of it is some First Ones™️ magic.
The implication is that the Arbiter’s completely emotionless judgement with no room for leeway isn’t what mortal souls should be judged by and an arbiter that takes into account their desires and has a sense of humanity is better for everyone in the long run.
Now, the theory where it was supposed to be Sylvanas? I could see Afrasiabi planning that ending, but once he was gone, the team that was left probably realized that putting Sylvanas in a lore storage where she could come back at a later time made way more sense from a practicality standpoint. Nobody wanted Kerrigan 2: WoW edition.
I subscribe to a fan theory that Zovaal was the ‘prototype arbiter’ and the First Ones never got around to finishing a release version before they disappeared. Unlike the other Eternal Ones. Hence why there is an empty Arbiter body in Zereth Mortis and why we don’t see a prototype Arbiter in the prototype pantheon encounter.
Given Afrasiabi’s hatred of Sylvanas, why would he give a Xel’naga equivalent moment?
Also, both have their downsides. The all-logic arbiter lacks compassion and perspective. But the emotions can lead to biases that can cause unfair judgements (which is why Bastion has the memory-erasure system).
It would effectively kill the character in such a way as to prevent them from returning. I’m not familiar with the quest line that created the new arbiter, slowly working a character through that content, so I’m probably wrong but I’d be shocked if the soul used to power/code the arbiter can be removed once infused… and people are very particular about their lore.
It’s almost like even starting down this path of lore expansion/revision was just a really bad idea…
Though this also plays into the killing of Sylvanas line of argument as the all-logic (ie full suppression of self) version would have further killed Sylvanas.
Honestly if your goal is to kill/destroy some(one/thing) that someone you hate loves, the total destruction of them while leaving a memorial of that act in place is fairly sadistic and fits into the personality of matrix of all abusers that I’ve had the missfortune of knowing in real life.
I think I understand. You’re saying if the Arbiter creation process consumed her soul completely so she vanished like Garrosh or Arthas.
That was more my assessment of different kinds of Arbiter and why Bastion had their system. I have no idea who or what you faced, I was just pointing out the reason for Bastion’s memory erasure (remove biases that could lead to unfair treatment; imagine a racist becoming Kyrian and gaining power to throw the souls of people they hate into damnation, regardless of their actions).
That’s no longer the case. Every soul is now seen as ultimately redeemable. Just like at the end of Lucifer.
The actions of the Arbiters and the others led to the discontent of Zuvaal and Devos. As well as the eternal condemmnation of souls sent to the Maw. Arguably the sytem that Pelagos replaced was even more flawed.
He can’t do worse than his predecessor.
Cosmic beings can multi-task. Just like Dr. Manhattan, who can be his own two thirds of a threesome and work out complex physics problems at the same time.
I couldn’t imagine anyone less deserving to ascend to godhood and pass moral judgement on people than the genocidal maniac who used to commit war crimes while she still alive. So I’m glad fans complained loud enough for Blizzard to listen.
I’m not sure if that was even ever the plan, but if it was, I could imagine it would’ve been a holdover decision from Afrasiabi. It would make sense, since he spent the past decade or so slowly turning Slyvanas into his self-insert by making her more sociopathic.
